Film

Cinema has long been obsessed with the concept of machines that can think, feel and one day be indistinguishable from their creators. When done correctly, artificial intelligence as a cinematic device can serve as a perfect mirror for human anxiety, ambition and existential dread; at its worst, it’s a goofy stab at speculative fear-mongering, nervously […]

I think how much you’ll like “Disclosure Day,” the newest film from Steven Spielberg, depends a lot on what your favorite film of his is. From the raw, thrumming energy of “Jurassic Park,” “Jaws” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” to the throwback sentimentality of “E.T.” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” back around […]

Going to the movies this weekend made me feel like I was living through a cultural event horizon of the late 20th century, where Hollywood desperately picks up and shakes my inner child just to see if any more loose change falls out. This week, the box office gave us two diametrically opposed flavors of […]

The theatrical release and box office explosion of the new A24 psychological horror film “Backrooms” represents a landmark moment in modern cinema. It serves as the intersection of three major contemporary cinematic trends: the box office dominance of horror, the mainstream acceptance of a new YouTube-to-cinema pipeline and a successful push to get Gen Z […]

Whether you enjoy “The Mandalorian and Grogu” depends entirely on what you want from your “Star Wars” these days. Don’t get me wrong, the film is entertaining and it’s easy to get lost in director Jon Favreau’s version of Star Wars, where every frame is packed with stunningly designed aliens and monsters. Yet, it’s hard […]

I don’t think this is a very controversial statement, but we are absolutely living in the golden age of horror movies. We exist in a time where a grimy, bluesy vampire movie like “Sinners” can become the most Oscar-nominated film in history and a bonkers, singular vision like “Weapons” can nab Amy Madigan her first […]

Every once in a while, a movie comes along with a premise so fundamentally weird that you can almost hear the studio executives break into a flop sweat, wondering how many Happy Meals and cross-promotional merch to make the juice worth the squeeze. “The Sheep Detectives” is exactly the kind of movie that, when you […]

As someone who has dressed like a color blind retiree since childhood, I know next to nothing about couture, modern fashion, or why one designer brand outranks another. Watching “The Devil Wears Prada” all the way back in the year of our lord 2006, I knew the film really wasn’t “for me,” yet I still […]

Everyone who goes to the movies is after something different. Relaxation, stimulation, escapism—all are valid. That’s why it’s hard for me to reconcile exactly who “Michael,” the Michael Jackson musical biopic, is meant for and if its existence is healthy for culture and society at large. The film ends in 1988, at the height of […]

We’re already a third of the way through 2026 and the movies that have made big money have been the usual suspects (“Super Mario Galaxy” and “Scream 7”) with some word-of-mouth crowdpleasers (“Project Hail Mary” and “Send Help”) and a viral micro-budget horror movie with a massive YouTube fanbase (“Iron Lung”). But several pretty great […]